Iwo Jima Vets Slam Time Cover, Dismiss Global Warming As "A Joke"

Iwo Jima veterans are outraged over Time magazine's decision to use the iconic World War II image of American soldiers hoisting a flag at Iwo Jima for the latest cover on "the war on global warming." The Business & Media Institute reports Iwo Jima veterans call the Time cover a "disgrace" and dismiss global warming as a "joke":

Donald Mates, an Iwo Jima veteran, told the Business & Media Institute on April 17 that using that photograph for that cause was a "disgrace."

"It's an absolute disgrace," Mates said. "Whoever did it is going to hell. That's a mortal sin. God forbid he runs into a Marine that was an Iwo Jima survivor."

Mates also said making the comparison of World War II to global warming was erroneous and disrespectful.

"The second world war we knew was there," Mates said. "There's a big discussion. Some say there is global warming, some say there isn't. And to stick a tree in place of a flag on the Iwo Jima picture is just sacrilegious."

Another Iwo Jima veteran echoes Mates' reservations about global warming being a worth cause for a reprise of the famous scene:

Lt. John Keith Wells, the leader of the platoon that raised the flags on Mt. Suribachi and co-author of "Give Me Fifty Marines Not Afraid to Die: Iwo Jima" wasn't impressed with Time's efforts.

"That global warming is the biggest joke I've ever known," Wells told the Business & Media Institute. "[W]e'll stick a dadgum tree up somebody's rear if they want that and think that's going to cure something."

Time managing editor Rick Stengel defended the cover on MSNBC yesterday, saying:

"One of the things we do in the story is we say there needs to be an effort along the lines of preparing for World War II to combat global warming and climate change. It seems to me that this is an issue that is very popular with the voters, makes a lot of sense to them and a candidate who can actually bundle it up in some grand way and say, 'Look, we need a national and international Manhattan Project to solve this problem and my candidacy involves that.' I don't understand why they don't do that."

Watch:

Comments

[Honest George]

iF THERE ARE vETS OUT THER THAT HAVEN'T BEEN BACK i WAS STATIONEDON THE iSLAND IN1959 AND HAVE SSOME NICE SLIDES OF tHE mONUMENT BUILT ON THE ISLAND ON TOP OF sURABACHI AND SOME PICTURES OF sUIRIBACHI. i COULE SENFD A FEW OUT TO ANYONE WHO WAS ACTUALLY IN THE BATTLE. .THe comments by ADMIRAL NIMITZ ABOUT BRAVERY GIVE YOU A CHILSEND ME A E-MAIL [e-mail]. Please no nasty letters as I also served
honesrt george ALSO NO CHARGE I PROMISE

[TScheisskopf]

My Dad and Mom were both vets of WWII. They were also on the environmental tip as soon as people started talking about it. Dad worked for much of his later life on various enviromentally-friendly technologies. When people started becoming conscious of environmental concerns, Mom and Dad immediately Got It, and it stuck with them to the end.

Something about the song these two "sore-tailed cats", who were quoted in the article, are singing does not particularly sound in tune. People of Mom and Dad's era were not bitter and nasty people like that, for the largest part. They had earned their sense of optimism and sense of larger responsibility to society through a very tough process. They had grown up during The Great Depression and knew full well how bad things could get, and why they got that way. All the people of their generation that I knew and know wanted, and want, America's future to be better for everyone.

Because leaving things better than you found them, in all aspects, is a very responsible thing to do. That generation was about responsibility, without the adornment of rhetoric and posturing. Just do it.

I think that when it comes to this story, a little more aggressive reportage, after the fact, is in order. Those old coots don't ring true.

[Meah]

I agree. The real Iwo Jima soldiers would now be between 85 and 90. Yet they blog? Gimme a break!
The so called soldiers who post here are NOT anyone who was in Iwo Jima during WWII. They are troll frauds, swiftboat types, who think they own the country. Their grandchildren are in danger of having lives nothing like we have ever known. Yet they rant on about the Iwo Jima photograph, and how global climate change is a joke.

[Tommygun264]

"In my day we abused the environment any way we wanted and we loved it!"

Don't bring up the fact that the "historic photo" at Iwo Jima was staged propaganda or point out the fact that global climate change is a fact and the only members of the scientific community who dispute it are biostitutes funded by the fossil fuels industries. These veterans who fought at Iwo Jima are what, eighty to ninety years old? It's not like anyone is going to be convincing them to change their minds about anything. Let's just be their thankful descendants, honor their bravery and sacrifices as we should, then get off their lawns and leave them in peace.

[fantagor]

Curmudgeonly WWII vets purport to be experts on Global Warming because they were in Iwo Jima when the staged flag-raising photo-op was snapped.

I, for one, take my cues on important issues of the day from guys about three breathes from dead and not the 2,500 scientists who agreed that there is a 90% chance that GW is an anthropogenic problem.

Who needs science when you can just ask gramps and other old white guys who were happy that all the colored people were segregated in one brigade!

Randy

[helloworld2008]

Oh, givie it a rest!

The original photo was a big fake anyway.

These rightwing trolls should STFU.

[Demsrevil]

helloworld is one of those people who does not have the GUTS to wear the uniform of our armed forces. whimp! why don't you STFU.

[andiammisterbones]

...and you served, where, Jethro?

[marchamlin]

Just because I don't want to put on a uniform to go fight in George Bush's illegal war doesn't make me a wimp. I'll kick your ass.

[galaxian]

"Mortal sin"?
Nah, these don't sound like very old men.
Beside, the photo was of a reproduction of an event, a copy of a copy. I doubt the gods will punish.

[alohaboxer]

Hate when plages uses Semper Fi as a tag line. Kind of like Clinton and her lame attempt at appearing all about guns. Sure, she used to be a southern farm girl, but that is not the case now, so let it go.

Once one always one, I know, but only if you chose to support them now. And saying you support troops and not the war is like "I like the Yankees, but hope they lose every game."

Either be a (i'm guessing here) hippied out, harley driving Vietnam vet who is simultaneously a Seattlelite, Portlandite, or some other "ite" in the greater Pacific Northleft, and stop using Semper Fi.
Or be a Marine and leave the soldiers out of your personal BS, actually being faithful.

[ripples]

Well nothing is sacred anymore and we seem to be hell bent on calling our struggles wars - 'the war on or against drugs, terrorism, global warming etc'...yes the Iwo Jima photo was staged and yes it sometimes gets a little old listening to vets...but the picture is a reflection of sacrifice and victory, it has a special meaning to WW 2 vets and others...Time is guilty not only of poor taste but lack of imagination

[andiammisterbones]

You left out the GOP's war on brains.

[jmklein]

Radioresearch,

Time in combat during WWII was very different from the other wars. In WWII hundreds of thousands of Americans were being slaughtered en masse. Battles were not intermittent skirmishes or one sided massacres like in Korea where the North Koreans and Chinese took millions of casualties.

Soldiers had those short tours of duty simply because they would mentally break down after all the slaughter if they staid longer. The war was so horrible they had to rotate like that.

[RadioResearch]

I find it interesting that only two of these Iwo Jima vets have complained and neither has stated that they were actually there at the raising - do they protest too much or were they selectively chosen for their comments?

The greatest generation is much overarted as are many of the veterans who served in the war. The average time in combat, for the ten percent who were actually in combat, was approximately four months. The average time in combat for Korea (for the twenty percent in combat) was slightly over six months, the average time in combat for Viet Nam (for the forty percent) was nine months. In Iraq, it is much higher yet.

The so called "greatest generation" is not really as great as they have been allowed to hype themselves. They did no more in terms of sacrifice than any other generation of soldiers - dying for your country is the same regarless of the war.

Remember, the "Best Generation" gave us the cold war, Korea, Viet Nam, five recessions, the Middle east conflict, Saddam Hussein, the Persian Gulf War and a lot of world problems including the rise in global warming and climate change - so of course some of them are angry at using their symbol of self-aggrandizing heroism for a peaceful cause. After all, what if the whole world realized that climate change is a threat and came together peacefully to resolve it? Why, that might just obsolete war, oil, excessive wealth, and aristocratic

[ramal]

Whatever happened to "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." Sounds like senility has set in with the greatest generation.

[hip dibler]

lighten up francis.

[noneIn2008]

Maybe they should have used this cover on their 90's cover on the coming Ice Age. Desperate attempt by Time to get some free coverage to hawk a meaning less magazine of little relevance. Time is a dieing dinosaur of very little relevance. The article does prompt two questions: 1. Who still reads Time? 2. How do they convince advertisers to waste money on ads?

[mrmxyzptlk]

"Maybe they should have used this cover on their 90's cover on the coming Ice Age."

I found the article you're referring to, from January 31, 1994. The story wasn't referenced on that issue's cover, by the way:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,980050,00.html

There's something you might not understand about science: Scientists continually gather evidence and revise their theories based on available evidence. What they do not do is jump willy-nilly from one unfounded hypothesis to another. As the body of scientific knowledge grows, ideas are continually refined. We know stuff now that we didn't in 1994.

The media do sometimes tend to sensationalize and simplify scientific stories. Also, in an effort to appear fair, they will sometimes give a disproportionate amount of coverage to alternative "viewpoints" that are actually based on utter ignorance, such as Michael Crichton dismissing global warming. No wonder folks like you are confused.

[nogimmicks]

It is true that global warming is a joke. It is a distraction from real problems. It is like saying "Look there is a bird attacking you from over there!" and then quietly smashing idiot's head with a bat and taking his money.

The real problems are the following:
1) control: an almost complete take over of the money, media and government by destructive narrow-interest forces
2) wars, economy: - results from 1)
3) ecology: overpopulation and the related pollution,
4) US healthcare:

Problems 2,3 and 4 are easily solvable if 1) is taken care of. Otherwise .. face the music

[RanTheMan]

My father is a WWII vet, and is constantly reminding everyone of his service to this country with phrases like, "You can thank a veteran for being able to say that".
While on its basest level, it's probably true, he, and his buddies beat their service records to death.
I love my old man, but enough is enough.

This was all exponentially exacerbated when Tom Brokaw's book, "The Greatest Generation" came out. (Another term that they like to beat people over the head with as well, by the way.)

I'm sick and tired of listening to vets from that time reminding all of us just how great they were, and how grateful we all should be.
We know it. Now shut up before you destroy the respect we have for you.

[Gumby69]

I think any generation is able to stand up to any crises when it occurs. Ours is Global Warming. That picture is not an insult but a challenge to that crises.